For me TI 2009 has proved to be the best ever TI product - I run Vista. I'm not interested in all the fancy window dressing and simply want a backup product that does what it says on the tin i.e. perform full image backups and restore full image backups, not secure zone or documents or system state etc. etc. just full backups. For this preferred use TI is the business, simple as that.

At the minimum this application should work correctly when doing full backups whether scheduled or run manually. E-mail notifications are helpful. Adding other ‘features’ is not really appreciated and will confuse many users. I tell prospective users to read the user guide (which they will probably not do). The application has added a lot of fluff options which is not appreciated. In my opinion the marketing folks really need to re-think their objectives. More may not be better. Do what you do well and re-think the rest, perhaps as options.

The biggest issue with me at present with build 9646 English, and perhaps other previous releases, is the failure of the Rescue Media CD to uncheck the boxes (all of them) by default that read Files to exclude. To me this is a major issue in that it at least effects Office 2003 and 2007 which may require a lot of time to explain the corrective action. It appears that this will require a new build to fix the Recovery Manager folder in that the user cannot make changes here.

Since I only do manual imaging of my C drive containing only the OS and apps, I obviously agree. However, it ain't going to sell product. When people are buying the product and they do the "feature compare" guess where the basic product ends up. Even the reviewer was all excited about the cool features that most of us don't give a hoot about.

The biggest issue with me at present with build 9646 English, and perhaps other previous releases, is the failure of the Rescue Media CD to uncheck the boxes (all of them) by default that read Files to exclude. To me this is a major issue in that it at least effects Office 2003 and 2007 which may require a lot of time to explain the corrective action. It appears that this will require a new build to fix the Recovery Manager folder in that the user cannot make changes here.

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Why not just make a WinPE disk and use Mustangs very nifty Acronis plugin. That way you can bin your Rescue Media CD and boot from Windows which does leave the exclude files option unchecked so Office is not affected, plus your restores will be very quick indeed. You can make a disk in around 15 mins with almost no technical skill.

I have been using ATI 2009 since it was introduced. I use it in Vista and a pre-beta version of Windows 7. I make back up images and restore them, that is all I need. I probably have made/restored 10 images in the last 2 days - not a single issue.

Maybe Acronis should not try to do so much with ATI Home. Keep it simple, keep it working, and keep it cheap - can't lose

Why not just make a WinPE disk and use Mustangs very nifty Acronis plugin. That way you can bin your Rescue Media CD and boot from Windows which does leave the exclude files option unchecked so Office is not affected, plus your restores will be very quick indeed. You can make a disk in around 15 mins with almost no technical skill.

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It would fix that problem like it does the driver problem. I have made both BartPE and VistaPE disks but for me this is not an ideal solution - I like starting my restores with TI in Windows not fool around with CDs.

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I am a bit concerned about the latest review by PC Magazine. Some reviews of course are based but it would be great if Acronis addressed this at some point.

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Having read through the whole review, it doesn't strike me as overly biased, beyond the normal comparison with another product. Several of the problems reported by the reviewer have indeed been reported and confirmed on this forum.

Like a number of other posters I use TI 2009 only for manually making and restoring full drive and partition images. I have an XP machine used primarily for software development and testing, which has multiple operating system restores each week, and TI 2009 like v10 before it has never failed me in this task.

Acronis has not limited the software to this purpose only, but if advanced or optional features are added to any retail software, those features must work, and if they don't then any reviewer is not only within their rights to highlight this, but would be remiss if they didn't. If indeed the failure of an advanced feature did cause a terminal the collapse of the operating system, I think the "But I'm reluctant to recommend it" comment was not overly harsh.

I know the advantages of having a BartPE, VistaPE or WinPE recovery CD, however purchasers of retail imaging and backup software should not have to go through the hassle of producing these to enable them to use Acronis. If the Linux system Acronis use cannot be made to work with the product properly, then Acronis should move to a different option (perhaps even licence WinPE) that can be supplied with or as part of their software.

I know the advantages of having a BartPE, VistaPE or WinPE recovery CD, however purchasers of retail imaging and backup software should not have to go through the hassle of producing these to enable them to use Acronis. If the Linux system Acronis use cannot be made to work with the product properly, then Acronis should move to a different option (perhaps even licence WinPE) that can be supplied with or as part of their software.

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It's not quite that simple though is it? The Linux environment has worked for me on all versions of TI but until 2009 USB2 only worked as USB1 on two out of my three PC's with the resultant dire restore speeds and there's the rub. There are a myriad of hardware combinations on the market and it's almost impossible for any software developer to say with confidence that their product will work with them all. If Acronis were to include BartPE VistaPE or WinPE with every product then there would be licensing issues and higher product costs.

If I was a PC Mag reviewer, I wouldn't recommend this software either. It seems Acronis does not even care about these problems, instead telling customers to individually contact them through live chat.

ATI 2009 shouldn't even have been released with such major bugs. These bugs should have been a HIGH priority with the developers. The stupid default exclude .bak files debacle which hoses all Microsoft Office installations on restore (which I experienced that firsthand), amid other problems so simple as uninstalling ATI 2009. I was able to test restoring an image simply because ATI 2009 does not uninstall at ALL, and trying to manually uninstall it hosed my system with a BSOD on boot. This is a newly installed WinXP system, and I thought I would give ATI 2009 a shot. Never again will I make that mistake. If anyone knows how to safely uninstall this buggy software please help.

In the meantime I am using DriveImage XML now, backing up is okay, haven't tried restoring yet.

If I was a PC Mag reviewer, I wouldn't recommend this software either. It seems Acronis does not even care about these problems, instead telling customers to individually contact them through live chat.

ATI 2009 shouldn't even have been released with such major bugs. These bugs should have been a HIGH priority with the developers. The stupid default exclude .bak files debacle which hoses all Microsoft Office installations on restore (which I experienced that firsthand), amid other problems so simple as uninstalling ATI 2009. I was able to test restoring an image simply because ATI 2009 does not uninstall at ALL, and trying to manually uninstall it hosed my system with a BSOD on boot. This is a newly installed WinXP system, and I thought I would give ATI 2009 a shot. Never again will I make that mistake. If anyone knows how to safely uninstall this buggy software please help.

In the meantime I am using DriveImage XML now, backing up is okay, haven't tried restoring yet.

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If you haven't done a restore yet, you're living dangerously! Until you have a successful restore you don't really know that the software will do what it is intended to do.

ATI has been floating on the rave reviews that older versions received -- especially 7, 8 and 9.

Many subsequent reviews seemed to rely on press releases and old reviews. E.g., ATI11 was rarely pegged in reviews for all of it's critical faults. If a reveiw is finally hitting home on some of the critical faults in ATI, some of which have been around for several versions, maybe Acronis will finaly take notice and put quality before annual release dates.

I thought versions 8 and 10 were great-- probably the best around. But ATI is no longer the king of the backup/imaging programs, it is a merely a poor relation now :-(

Someday it might come back. A fixed up ATI12/2009, with improved Full backup automated file management could make ATI king again. For now, it's best kep outside the town walls.

Acronis is a great product no mistake about it.
However....that typed TI was much better in previous versions
even the backup priority/compression stuff I forget which one, on some versions can be a low by default but should be a normal really.
You then may see a notice when done in the logs with a yellow exclamation about the low setting.
As far as adding a bunch of bloat to TI why bother?
Bells and whistles are great, but lets get the meat and potatoes down pat 100%
Do we really need an email notice thinghy in the home versions.

In addition to the comments in this posting see the info in the following link, particularily postings 15 and 16. In my opinion this was an oversight with the latest 9646 build. Hopefully they will correct this quickly.

What do you mean? Restoring using the Recovery CD results in failure to restore .bak files?

If that's the case, why on earth would Acronis make such a feature?

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You just have to make sure that .bak files aren't excluded in the backup or the restore. IMO, anybody making an image shouldn't exclude anything other than .tibs. The space taken is usually very little and you never know when you might need a .bak, .tmp or whatever.

The real stupidity in this lies with Microsoft who put a critical entry in a .bak file. Users assume that a .bak is only a document backup file and there is no reason to keep it if they are happy with the main document file.

Basically I agree with seekforever but I feel somewhat stronger about it.

It’s my opinion that no files should be excluded unless the user makes an effort to specifically enter the extension for exclusion. This includes *.tib files. Any user referencing *.tib files has some experience with the product and can make that decision. There should then be an option to set any changes as the default if possible in the Rescue Media CD, but I realize that may not be easily achieved using Linux as the base (which is a subject for another time and has be covered previously.

Simply stated the box for exclusions should at a minimum should be unchecked as the default when using the Rescue Media CD.

I’m spending a lot of time trying to explain the problem to users’ where I’ve recommended this product. Many of these folks really don’t want to take the time to deal with it but are right there when things don’t work out to their expectations.

... There should then be an option to set any changes as the default if possible in the Rescue Media CD, but I realize that may not be easily achieved using Linux as the base (which is a subject for another time and has be covered previously.

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There is no reason why it can't be setup and the custom configuration burned to the CD. TI now allows you to setup the quiet... commands now.

... I’m spending a lot of time trying to explain the problem to users’ where I’ve recommended this product. Many of these folks really don’t want to take the time to deal with it but are right there when things don’t work out to their expectations.

Bruce

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This is why people who write user interfaces and similar program structures should be made to do stints on the helpdesk. When they answer 1000 of the same question over and over and get a better understanding of how non-programmers view applications they are less likely to keep contributing to the problem.